We stayed at a cabin at Mono Village these last 2 weeks (outside of Bridgeport on Upper Twin Lake). I and my family have visited Yosemite and the Eastern Sierras many times for decades. We KNOW what not to leave in a car as far as bears go. But.......
My wife and I were visiting friends at another cabin and as we got up from the campfire to return to our cabin at about 9:30 P.M. I heard a "pow" and thought it was a bear knocking over a trash can nearby. Bears are all over this little resort even during the day. Upon returning to our cabin I was going to check the cars and roll up the windows tight. As we walked by our Ford Escape parked in front of the cabin my wife was on the side closest to the car (about one foot away from the driver's side). She happened to glance over into the driver's side window and jumped right into me yelling, "There's a bear in our car!". (There's somehting you don't hear every day). I looked over and sure enough there was a bear sitting in the driver's seat staring at us through the driver's window! (There's a sight you don't see every day) I immediately knew what the "pow' sound was and saw that the passenger side window was blown out. I immediately remembered what a bear did to another car up there a few years ago (ate out most of the inside of the car including seats and dash) so my immediate thought was, " I have to get this bear out of my car immediately." I started to bang on the hood and yell at it. It just sat there and loooked at me as if saying "What's your problem dude?"
I walked over to the driver's side and started banging on the windshield. We were only about a foot away from each other separated by the windshield. As I banged on the windshield it thrust it's face forward towards me and let out a snarly growl. I retreated to the front of the car and banged and yelled some more. This time it stuck its snout outside the slightly open driver's door window and hissed and snarled at me. This bear obviously was not afraid of people. After about 2 more minutes of this standoff I started to bounce the car up and down and side to side. It didn't like that and got up and started to head for the window it had broken. By this time people were gathering behind me. It stopped and looked at me and gave me one more snarl/growl and climbed out the window. I was at the driver's side now and once it went out I watched for it but couldn't see it. I thought, "Oh no, it's going to come around the car towards me". I started to back up and then finally saw it walking away from the car. After about 20 ft. it stopped, turned around, and gave me one more snarl and left.
Inside the car was blood on the seats (those glass chards are sharp), bear hair all over the window frame where he had squeezed through, and bear slobber here and there. Glass was inside and outside the car and on the top of the car and on the hood. The passenger door interior had some damage. I looked for the culprit that attracted it and found some shredded tin foil on the floor. I looked at my wife and she sheepishly said, "Uh oh, I forgot to get the brownies (homemade) out of the center console."
That bear beat me to the car by about 4 minutes as I was on my way to check out the cars and close all the windows. My family knows better than to leave food in cars in those areas but since the brownies in the center console weren't out in the open for them to see they forgot about them. The bear apparently opened and closed the center console with no damage.
Luckily I was able to get a glass company to come out from Gardnerville NV. (80 miles away) to put a new window in the car. Needless to say we inspected both cars inch by inch for food (which we normally do) the rest of the trip, including the center consoles. The people who work at Mono Village knew exactly which bear it was as it has been getting into stuff all summer long there. My car was quite the tourist attraction for a couple days. People who were staying there in the campground and the cabins came around to see the damage.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/14/2011 08:24AM by mtn man.